Pension Funds Are Hooked on Private Equity, No Matter the Risks Bloomberg
The Olympics
More main character energy:
insane aura
51-yr old Yusuf Dikec of Turkey shows up to the Olympics for shooting without special lenses…
without ear protection…
hand in his pocket & both eyes open…
and casually takes home a silver medal pic.twitter.com/qRB3kwRZmz
— Warren Sharp (@SharpFootball) July 31, 2024
Climate
Probability Estimates of a 21st Century AMOC Collapse (preprint) arXiv
Cautious Optimism In Helen Scales’ ‘What The Wild Sea Can Be: The Future Of The World’s Ocean’ 3 Quarks Daily
“Where am I going to live?”: Questions for Colorado doctors amid choking smoke and ozone Colorado Sun
Wildfire smoke may be worse for brain health than other air pollution, dementia research finds PBS
Mother Nature’s Punching Bag Vermont Political Observer
Can the moon help preserve Earth’s endangered species? Space.com
Syndemics
Bird flu: Even Rassmussen understands there’s a problem
There's a big problem with the way the US is responding to the H5N1 cattle outbreak.
Samples are not being tested in a timely manner (months later) and then these results are not being disclosed in a timely manner (again, months later) either.
This outbreak is not containable. https://t.co/YkoYLCczsn
— Dr. Angela Rasmussen (@angie_rasmussen) July 31, 2024
CDC: $5 Million Initiative to Improve Uptake of Seasonal Flu Shots For Livestock Workers Avian Flu Diary. “But given the downsides, it makes sense to try to reduce the the opportunities for a reassortment event that might provide H5N1 with a pathway to human adaptation.”
Victoria’s new ‘clean air’ project could help end the COVID pandemic and boost productivity ABC Australia
Good on ya, The West Australian:
🇦🇺 Cough, Cough, Cough
▫Whooping cough cases surge in WA’s South West
▫@kirovkate
▫https://t.co/2FU4Mt6IqB 👈#frontpagestoday #Australia @westaustralian 🇦🇺 pic.twitter.com/OmvXfnilLi— 𝙵𝚛𝚘𝚗𝚝 𝙿𝚊𝚐𝚎𝚜 𝚃𝚘𝚍𝚊𝚢 📰 (@ukpapers) July 30, 2024
Covid-19 Pauses Outer Cape Entertainment The Provincetown Independent
Is it heatstroke or COVID? Central Japan emergency medical responders on high alert The Mainichi. ‘Tis a mystery!
Long-term effects of COVID-19 on endothelial function, arterial stiffness, and blood pressure in college students: a pre-post-controlled study BMC Infectious Diseases. From the Abstract: “Our study demonstrated that COVID-19 has long-term detrimental effects on vascular function in college students. However, arterial stiffness tends to improve over time, while [Blood Pressure (BP)] may exhibit the opposite trend.”
Institutional COVID denial has killed public health as we knew it. Prepare to lose several centuries of progress. The Guantlet
China?
Caixin Explains: Why and How China’s Overhauling Monetary Policy (Part 1) Caixin Global. Commentary:
4/7
difficult for the central bank to influence other interest rates — in the money market and in bank lending. The PBOC is also trying to control too many interest rates and in the process is often sending conflicting or mixed signals to the markets."— Michael Pettis (@michaelxpettis) August 1, 2024
Chinese premier calls for ‘tangible, effective, accessible’ policies to aid economy South China Morning Post
China’s Robotaxi Dreams Spark Economic Anxiety Over AI’s Threat Bloomberg
Understanding Japanese Unionism: The Shuntō System in Context Nippon.com
India
50 jobs, 30 years: The unseen labour of an Indian female worker BBC
‘New wave’: Why suspected rebel attacks are rising in Kashmir’s Jammu area Al Jazeera
The Great Game
Navigating the Middle: Georgia’s strategic position in the Middle Corridor among EU and China JAM News
Syraqistan
Prof. John J. Mearsheimer: Netanyahu’s Grave Mistakes (video “Live IN EIGHT HOURS,” “August 1 at 3:00 PM”) Judge Napolitano, YouTube. Lambert here: Normally, I’d wait until tomorrow to run this, but the topic is a matter of some urgency and Mearsheimer’s views are valuable. A query:
The Middle East is on the verge of massive escalation involving several countries.
The Secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin, vowed that the US would intervene in the war to protect Israel.
But neither the President nor VP have said a word about this. Who is running the US Govt? pic.twitter.com/lw1mC10Ozf
— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) July 31, 2024
* * * Storming Sde Teiman, Far-right Lawmakers Try to Inject Chaos Into the Israeli Army Haaretz
Israel Is Already Over Alon Mizrahi
* * * The Murder of Ismail Haniyeh Patrick Lawrence, Scheer Post
Israel’s spies take their revenge FT
Israel Has a History of Killing Hamas Leaders Who Are Trying To Secure Ceasefires Mehdi Hasan, Zeteo
Yemen’s Houthi leader warns of severe consequences for Israel over Hamas chief’s assassination Anadolu Agency
Haniyeh killing in Iran risks dragging US into war it says it doesn’t want Al Jazeera
* * * Troubled by Google Maps Reviews Crooked Timber
* * * WHO chief Tedros says polio detected in Gaza, appeals for action Straits Times. Meanwhile:
CDC is thrilled to support Team End Polio! Visit https://t.co/w70HvUTekj and join us in the fight against this devastating, preventable disease so we can #EndPolio. pic.twitter.com/7MQQb3F0Wy
— Mandy K. Cohen, MD, MPH (@CDCDirector) July 31, 2024
Dear Old Blighty
What will the comfortable classes do? Funding the Future
New Not-So-Cold War
Intensity of Russian attacks growing: 156 combat engagements across combat zone over past day Ukrainska Pravda
A Personal Discussion of Russian National Security Counterpunch
Ukraine receives first F-16 fighter jets to bolster defenses against Russia, officials tell AP AP
* * * Voting Against Nuclear War Scott Ritter, Consortium News
Ukraine’s Zelensky says he wants Russia ‘at the table’ for next peace summit France24
* * * Gershkovich reportedly released in massive Russian political prisoner swap BNE Intellinews
Russia : Music and Locomotives Pressenza
2024
Trump vs. NABJ: Hostility and questions about journalism FOX
Big Law rallies around Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign FT
Checking the Checkers: “Border Czar” (excerpt) Matt Taibbi, Racket News
Digital Watch
Tesla that killed motorcyclist was in Full Self-Driving mode The Register
Inside the WSJ’s Investigation of Tesla’s Autopilot Crash Risks WSJ
Copyright Office tells Congress: ‘Urgent need’ to outlaw AI-powered impersonation TechCrunch
Why I Finally Quit Spotify The New Yorker
Why the CrowdStrike bug hit banks hard Bits About Money
Healthcare
Medical Bills Catch Almost Half of Insured US Adults by Surprise Bloomberg
Boeing
Boeing Hires Kelly Ortberg as Its Next CEO WSJ
Boeing names new CEO; losses widen, negative cash flow again. Update 1, reaction. Leeham News and Analysis
In new CEO, Boeing gets ‘the kind of person who gives a damn’ FT
The Final Frontier
No, Boeing Starliner’s NASA astronauts are not stranded in space. Here’s why. Space.com
Imperial Collapse Watch
The Army Bet $11M on The Rock and UFL Ginning Up Enlistments. It May Have Actually Hurt Recruiting Efforts military.com
Class Warfare
How Thousands of Middlemen Are Gaming the H-1B Program Bloomberg
From Folkway to Art: The Transformation of Quilts JSTOR
Researchers introduce knitted furniture TechXplore
Antidote du jour (Da):
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
220 comments
Comments are closed.
A HARD CONVERSATION
(melody borrowed from I’ve Been All Around This World by The Grateful Dead)
Two hundred years and countin’ ain’t this country grand?
My two legs got blown away in Afghanistan
They gave me a medal the banks got cash in hand
Lord Lord we still don’t rule this world
What the hell might you do to even up that score?
Signed up I was true blue to the nation I fought for
My body is so broken and my mind is full of gore
Lord Lord we still don’t rule this world
(musical interlude)
My nephew went to Ukraine says it’s bad as bad can be
The Pentagon wants war to save Taiwan’s democracy
We’re never gonna stop until the whole damn world is free
Lord Lord we still don’t rule this world
My choice is either civil war or suicide at dawn
Either choice might get some folks to question what goes on
You can read the newspaper to see which way I’ve gone
Lord we still don’t rule this world
Two hundred years and countin’ ain’t this country grand?
I never had a half a chance to grow to be a man
Don’t enlist for college—you’ll die out in the sand
Lord Lord we still don’t rule this world
I’ll be performing a few songs for some peace activists in my area; would you mind if I sang this? The Dead song seems based on one of my favorite Dave Van Ronk performances Hang Me, Oh Hang Me.
It’ll be at a Hiroshima memorial, no money will be made, and I’d credit you. Thanks either way for lending us all your art and wit daily!
I have the joy of creating these lyrics. That’s enough for me. If you or anyone else can make use of them, please have at it. All of them are open source entirely.
Yes, another excellent piece. Reminds me of Stevie Wonder’s Front Line. Thanks again.
Hear, here!
different titles for the same song; dates back to the 1930s at least
https://www.chimesfreedom.com/2014/02/24/the-journey-of-hang-me-oh-hang-me-from-the-scaffold-to-the-screen/
ain’t folk music grand?
Black Francis
Mr. Dikec is also a cat person !
https://x.com/OlgaBazova/status/1818950440941203903?t=nO7zl69UWoVr78JMvK1FXg&s=19
Of course he is. An orange cat no less. Dude looks like he stepped out of a Guy Ritchie film.
My first thought was Pierre Cardin wearing a logo’d Polo shirt, brandishing a prop gun, on the runway of a fashion show.
…and 51 years old?
Shooting is obviously the easiest way onto the podium for the middle aged set…
“Ukraine receives first F-16 fighter jets to bolster defenses against Russia, officials tell AP”
No worries, the Russians are already on it. Their flight crews already have stencils of F-16s made up along with the black spray-paint needed and a Russian company has already offered a 15 million ruble (approximately $170,000) bounty for the first Russian pilot to shoot one of these down-
https://www.eurasiantimes.com/f-16-for-ukraine-russians-offer-170000-bounty/
Meanwhile the manufacturers of the F-16 already have made their PR statements ready to go blaming the Ukrainian pilots for not being good enough for those fighters.
Re Arterial stiffness after COVID. This is an issue I’ve been fighting with the medical doctors for THREE years now. My last GP appointment (Tuesday) had my fave GP acknowledge that this is almost certainly an issue but if she refers me to the appropriate consultant she’ll be told to “bugger off”…..just like like her colleague who tried to get a haematologist to investigate me.
Since my first Sars-COV2 infection (early Feb 2000) when I very nearly ended up ventilated in our plague pit, sorry, regional specialist hospital Emergency Dept, I have experienced four (two in each arm) major ruptures in veins with no explanation in terms of meds/BP/alcohol intake/etc. ONE was due to a trauma (don’t pet feral cats). The rest were spontaneous. Plus I, my sister, and both our biological parents have had repeated bursts of veins in the whites of our eyes. All since Feb 2000.
There’s more than enough data just from our family to get someone looking into this! But they’re simply doing triage of the worst cases round here. The orthopaediac trauma surgeon in April 2023 (who admitted me to hospital for 24 hour I/V antibiotics after the cat bite) said (in no uncertain terms as is the case with most orthopods) “this guy’s internal organs and blood is fine – no clotting issues etc – it’s his veins that are a big big worry”. Yet got outvoted 2-1 when it came to decision to discharge me next day. Nothing has been done to follow-up. GP on Tuesday admitted that “unless your heart CT shows anything odd, I’ll have absolutely no grounds to raise this again, I’m sorry”. At least she’s honest.
2020 doh
fat fingers
You sure have a tough row to hoe, Terry. Any chance of asking around to see if there is another part of the UK you could move to where the doctors there remember how to be actual doctors that can do medicine and stuff? If you, your sister and your parents all share the same condition, that should raise all sorts of red flags. Though to be fair, perhaps all those doctors are triaging because of the slowly increasing number of people that are experiencing long Covid and its assorted manifestations coming into the system. That has got to be a factor.
Many thanks – and also to Carla below.
The sad thing is I now live in a really “socio-economically rubbish part of the UK”. I don’t have alternatives here. Ironically, my “easiest” alternative would be to use my Australian passport and move back down under……I have a couple of very good friends on the East Coast….but I’d be (once again) so isolated from everyone else *sigh*.
Wishing you well too.
Best wishes with whatever path you choose, thanks for your additions to our community.
Terry, book a second opinion with a GP referral for a private consultation to a haematologist or vascular surgeon (probably the later). You can pick whomever you like in the country if Notts is notsogood….
It will cost you a couple hundred quid but in your situation, it is the only thing you need and its cheap because to the extent there are interventions, they are medical or lifestyle rather than a procedure (can’t replumb you wholesale).
Worst case outcome of initial consultation is a requirement for a battery of lab tests, vascular histopathology and/or imaging but you can decline all of those or push to approach them in a most-informative-for-least-cost order.
Thank you so much for posting this, terrifying as it is. It’s MORE terrifying that the medical establishment–and almost everyone else– is in denial. Wishing you and your family well, Terry.
Thank you :)
Consider proteolytic enzymes to remove internal scarring and clotting.
Fare well!
Thanks! I confess I have not had time/mental energy to do my usual “due diligence” but one thing that jumped out at me in my quick and dirty search was benefit of yoghurt – something I’ve been eating a lot of and which seems to have calmed my gastro issues a lot.
I don’t want to break NC rules and “make work” but if you know of any “quick and dirty off the top of your head” suggestions to make they’d be most welcome.
sounds like fermented foods could be good. kosher pickles, kimchi, etc. maybe upgrade your yoghurt to a kefir…
Nattokinase, Vitamin K2 (MK7, not MK4), and Vitamin E.
A good friend originally from Vienna recommends sauerkraut for gut health. It’s full of probiotics.
Low dose methylene blue. I take it as an antiviral and to support my endothelium and to support my mitochondria. Google “methylene blue endothelium.” Also google “low dose methylene blue health benefits.” THIS IS NOT MEDICAL ADVICE; GET YOUR DOCTOR’S PERMISSION BEFORE ANY USE; although methylene blue is overall very safe it can interfere badly with some meds, especially SSRIs (serotonin syndrome).
Terry Flynn:
Know that you are being thought about.
>Israel’s spies take their revenge FT
Assassinations have for decades been part of the Israeli repertoire. Iranian nuclear scientists have been gunned down on the streets of Tehran, Hamas militants have been poisoned in hotel rooms and torn to shreds by exploding cell phones, and there has been the ever-present threat of drone or air strikes.
Reminds me of a Tweet by Nassim Taleb I read yesterday.
Nassim Nicholas Taleb
@nntaleb
The assassinate in order to exist model is not sustainable
1:50 PM · Jul 31, 2024
there is an allegation that Mossad? was able to track the Hamas envoy via a WhatsApp backdoor on the envoy’s phone (or it could have been via the bodyguard’s phone).
Would explain the incredibly surgical strike.
such a negligient security hole, yet so plausible
Wat a minute. The Mossad don’t run WhatsApp. WhatsApp is run by Mark Zuckerberg. Oh…
You can send malware trough WhatsApp, apparently. An Israeli journalist is claiming his sources say Mossad planted a bomb in the apartment Haniyeh was using. That actually mathes the damage much better than anything delivered by a fighter. Small bomb or an anti-tank missile.
The article acts like it’s a new thing, but neglects to mention that Likud, the currently predominant Israeli party, was born of Irgun and Lehi, which had been creatively bombing and assassinating since before Israel even became a state. Indeed, Irgun can be said to have invented modern day terrorism with car and suitcase bombs against civilian populations and British government officials, they drove the British out of Mandate Palestine.
And lets not forget that Kahanism, which is currently predominant in Israel, will assasinate even Jews who don’t toe the line, which gave us the assassination of Yitzak Rabin. Attacks against Jews in the US led to the Jewish Defense League/Organization and Kach being banned there.
You can even argue that this is a tradition tracing all the way back to the Sicarii around 70 BCE and might be the first mention of terrorism in the NT at Acts 21:38.
This old earthquake’s gonna leave me in the poorhouse.
It seems like this whole town’s insane.
On the 31st floor a gold plated door
Won’t keep out the Lord’s burning rain.
Nah, older:
Jacob’s Daughter Dinah is Raped
34 Some time later, Dinah, Leah’s daughter whom she had borne to Jacob, went out to visit the women[a] of the land. 2 When Hamor the Hivite’s son Shechem, the regional leader, saw her, he grabbed her and raped her, humiliating her. 3 He was attached to[b] Dinah, Jacob’s daughter, since he loved the young woman and spoke tenderly to her.[c] 4 Then Shechem told his father Hamor, “Get this young woman[d] for me to be my wife.”
5 Because Jacob learned that Shechem had dishonored his daughter Dinah while his sons were still out with their cattle on the open range, he remained silent until they returned. 6 Meanwhile, Shechem’s father Hamor arrived to talk to Jacob. 7 Just then Jacob’s sons arrived from the field. When they heard what had happened, they were distraught with grief and livid with anger toward Shechem,[e] because he had committed a disgraceful deed in Israel by forcing Jacob’s daughter to have sex, an act that never should have happened.
8 But Hamor said this: “My son is deeply attracted to your daughter. Please give her to him as his wife. 9 Intermarry with us. Give your daughters to us and take our sons for yourselves. 10 Live with us anywhere you want.[f] Live, trade, and grow rich in it.”
11 Shechem also addressed Dinah’s[g] father and brothers. He told them, “If you’ll just approve me, I’ll give whatever you ask of me. 12 No matter how big or how extensive your demands are for a dowry and wedding presents from me, I’ll provide whatever you ask. Only give me the young lady to be my wife.”
Jacob’s Sons Plot Revenge
13 But Jacob’s sons answered Shechem and his father Hamor deceptively, because Shechem had dishonored their sister Dinah. 14 They told them, “We can’t do this. We can’t give our sister to a man who isn’t circumcised, because that would be insulting to us. 15 But we’ll agree to your request, only if you will become like us by circumcising every male among you. 16 Then we’ll give our daughters to you and take your daughters for ourselves, live among you, and be as a united people. 17 But if you won’t listen to us, then we’re going to take our daughter and leave.” 18 What they said pleased Hamor and his son Shechem, 19 so the young man did not delay the matter any further, since he was delighted with Jacob’s daughter.
Now Shechem was the most important person in his father’s household. 20 So Hamor and his son Shechem entered the gate of their city and addressed the men of their city. 21 “These men are at peace with us,” they announced. “Therefore, let them live in the land and trade in it. Look! The land is large enough for them. Let’s take their daughters as wives for ourselves and let’s give our sons to them.
22 “However,” they added, “only on this condition will the men consent to live with us and be united as a single people with us: every male among us will have to be circumcised just as they are. 23 Shouldn’t all their cattle, acquisitions, and animals belong to us? So, let’s give our consent to them, and then they’ll live with us.”
Simeon and Levi Attack Shechem
24 All of the males who heard Hamor and his son Shechem, who had gone out to the city gate, were circumcised. 25 Three days later, while they were still in pain, Jacob’s sons Simeon and Levi, two of Dinah’s brothers, each grabbed a sword and entered the city unannounced, intending to kill all the males. 26 They killed Hamor and his son Shechem with their swords, took back Dinah from Shechem’s house, and left. 27 Jacob’s other sons came along afterward and plundered the city where their sister had been defiled, 28 seizing all of their flocks, herds, donkeys, and whatever else was in the city or had been left out in the field. 29 They carried off all their wealth, their children, and their wives as captives, plundering everything that remained in the houses.
30 Then Jacob told Simeon and Levi, “You have certainly stirred up trouble for me! You’ve made me despised by[h] the Canaanites and the Perizzites who live in this territory. Because I have only a few men with me, they’re going to gather themselves together and attack me until I am totally destroyed, along with my entire household!”
31 “Should he have treated our sister like a whore?” they asked in response.
I suppose if you focus on the fact that mostly innocent civilians of Shechem were needlessly murdered, you’re left with the attack on Shechem being an act of terrorism, yes.
And to the list we can also add the genocide of Canaanites (although biblical scholars and archeologists now think the wandering Hebrews living alongside Palestinians *were* the Canaanites and this genocide likely didn’t happen).
Then there’s the execution of the 450 prophets of Baal, rather shares similarities to how the Israel is trying to murder a people for having different culture, religion and ideas.
And the genocide of the Amalekites, the attempted genocide of the Midianites…all meet the definition of large scale attacks on innocent civilians.
So yeah, the Zionists are looking to continue the tradition. And one has to wonder what it does to the wiring of the brain to be raised on these stories of god said it’s ok to murder everyone else cuz you’re speshul. While denying the existence of the rabbi who kinda told them to stop it already.
Ronen Bergman in Rise and Kill First: The Secret History of Israel’s Targeted Assassinaions details Israeli assassination practices. The book appears on it surface to be a report. On reflection, it is a threat. F*ck with us! We’ll kill you wherever you are.
“But shouldn’t I, as a Google maps reviewer, be equally free to tell readers that if they don’t like these politics, they might prefer not to eat at this place?”
“Yet I was troubled by two large collection boxes which aim “to provide immediate help for the victims of Hamas terrorism and their families.” As I wrote in the comment that I was not allowed to publish, there are plenty of people, including Jews, who think Israel is currently acting immorally in how it has chosen to respond to the attacks by Hamas. My own view is that a Holocaust memorial should not take sides in a conflict that so deeply divides people (of course, anyone is free to disagree with this view). The group of visitors who might find this troubling includes those who want to pay their respects to holocaust victims by visiting a memorial such as this one, and who think the only way to approach the current tragedy is by trying to see the dehumanization, the massive loss of human lives, and the enormous suffering, on both sides.”
How quaint of Robeyns to object to not being able to write those reviews while insisting that the “dehumanization” and “massive loss of lives” is somehow suffered equally by “both sides.”
Epic fail, Ingrid. Despite all its ghastly machinations, Google is not the problem here.
Perhaps she was speaking over time. The Jews certainly took some pain during WW2. Google can still be a problem, even if you don’t like the author.
Overall, I thought it was a sensible article and the problem the author highlighted should concern us.
Not having visited a place of worship in quite some time, the article reveals how much modern Judaism is tying itself up to genocide. This may end up a fatal wound to the ancient religion.
Christianity is similarly discrediting itself by trying to be neutral and ignoring the elephant in the room. If you ignore the ultimate evil, what credibility do you have protesting in front of abortion clinics and such?
I would love to see membership trends for both in ten years.
Your argument gains more credibility if you go out of your way to understand and sympathize with the entity in which you are faulting.
Can the Holocaust Memorial be relevant in any way given the Israeli genocide of Gazaans? Or do it’s supporters believe in an eye for an eye, &c, even if the eye in question belongs to an innocent third party whose land you are still in the process of stealing? I’m not even going to consider the concept of the “blood libel” in the context of the deliberate killing and maiming of Palestinian children by the IDF and the settler colonisalists.
>A Personal Discussion of Russian National Security – Counterpunch
No industrialized country has been willing to place military goals ahead of social and economic welfare, which isn’t the case regarding Soviet and Russian leaders over the decades. Putin’s war in Ukraine has backfired on every level, not only in Ukraine itself, but has led to a revival of NATO that finds two additional members in Sweden and Finland as well as increased military spending in most of the NATO countries.
I don’t know what has happened to Counterpunch. I stopped going to CP a couple of years ago, right around CV19 event. What does CP think the ~trillion dollars in MIC spending is doing to the U.S.’s “economic welfare.” Has “Putin’s war” (such a silly and immature personalization of Russia’s war) done damage to their economy? How has Russia’s global stature changed since the beginning of the conflict? “Backfired on every level?”
CP needs a reset.
NATO expansion to Finland did not really change the threat to Russia in the north (because Baltics and Norway are already in) but it did severely weaken Finland’s and NATO’s security (1000 km of militarized border).
As well as the whole world’s security once US brings some nuclear capable missiles to Finland to “send a message” and putting a nuclear war a hair trigger away.
I guess that can be defined a s backfired, if Russia was aiming to improve global security.
Several ago they started a beef with Caitlyn Johnstone. Somehow somewhen they got taken over by infiltrators.
I noticed the change soon after Russia invaded Ukraine, when they ran a story about CJ being a Russian agent. That made me recall that they had boasted about getting removed from the Propornot list merely by threatening to sue, which I realized could only have happened if they had deep state connections.
They had a problem with CJ well before that. I have rarely visited Counterpunch since Alexander Cockburn died.
I don’t know about deep state connections but they have gone sharply downhill under the infallible papacy of Pope St. Clair. He has a particular animus against Putin which appears to cloud his thoughts on Russia generally. The relish with which he described Putin’s coprolites from his trip down the Colorado was…disturbing. CP has also become rather more Party Line (St Clair’s I presume) in Cockburn’s lamentable absence these last dozen years. The only diversity of opinion comes from two libertarian holdovers, Knapp and Bovard, at least the latter of whom is occasionally interesting. Though Binoy Kampmark has after years of mediocrity become a good writer.
I tried to weather our differences but CP was so massively wrong about Russia I quit cold turkey a couple years ago.
I think that one may have been Paul Street? The trouble is that they accept contributions from a variety of writers based on filling up a quota of 9-10 articles a day. So quality varies. Some of the people that contribute hew very close to the “realist” national security state line, some want to be “radical, but respectable radical”, and some want to go all the way (although often in a beat/counterculture vein rather than political leftism). But a number of the contributors are not actually very good writers, whatever their political bent. I’m sure it’s tough curating that much content every day, so I hope they keep going. I’ve been following them and Antiwar.com and Consortium News longer than most other political opinion sites.
On writing quality variation, oh yeah. They should make more use of Cockburn’s work, always good and frequently stellar. Which brings to mind Hitchens at the peak of his political sensibilities in the 80s and early 90s. They both could punch out their opponent and let you share the satisfaction.
Also, isn’t the Russia economy doing just fine? Turns out handing out hundredths of thousands of rubles to average blokes as signing bonuses or just give work to everyone who is able/willing to work and jack up arms factory wages, can do wonders to general welfare, despite the war carnage. If only humanity could figure out how to do military Keynesianism without the military/war/destruction part.
The Goodman article is basically giving the Mearsheimer thesis so your quote lacks that context. I agree that the columns by this former CIA employee (and labeled as such) are variable but don’t think we should be too hard on Counterpunch which seems to be run on a shoestring and suffered a major blow with the death of Cockburn. St.Clair himself and some of their other writers have had much worse things to say about Putin and Russia.
I’ve always read “former CIA analyst” Goodman as an establishment realist type who would fit in well at the Quincy Institute. In that context the article is, at least, “realistic,” though that passage quoted by Zagonostra does represent the usual ridiculous Putin/Russia smear that is obligatory in such pieces.
I do agree though that the general editorial slant of St. Clair, Frank, Street, et al. sucks on Putin, Russia, and a number of related topics (e.g. Syria). There are still a few good authors who have not yet been driven away who write good stuff (Rob Urie comes to mind – does he still publish there?). But overall I’ve given up on CP. We don’t need more “both siderism” on the so-called “left” pretending to be anti-imperialist but actually providing cover for the neocon project.
Alex Cockburn died he was the owner and heart of CP. They drop a few writers also.
Deleting spotify: well done.
I also appreciate this guy’s attempt to boomerang the entshittification back to Spotify.
”Here the man steps into Spotify’s office and throws poo.
– The algorithms, i.e. the playlists from the streaming services, are ruining my life, he says in police interrogation.
Now the man is charged with serious damage and molestation and is required to pay SEK 330,000.”
Will Spotify be charged too with damage and molestation? Prison time for the WEF-stooge Daniel Ek?
https://www-expressen-se.translate.goog/noje/han-ler-kastar-sedan-bajs-pa-spotifys-kontor/?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=de&_x_tr_pto=wapp
I only use Spotify for podcasts, so I cannot directly relate to the author’s pain where its music listening experience is concerned, but app experience degradation via “improvements/updates” is a more generalized problem — viz. the recent Sonos app changes which have been a complete fiasco. Doctorow’s enshittification is real, and it’s everywhere …
I skimmed through, hoping that their reasoning might have included how Spotify is scrambling artists including just not paying ones with small listenerships. But no, it was just the app isn’t as friendly, and algorithms suck. I get it but in my view Spotify is paid piracy, you pay them, they (don’t) pay the performers.
I don’t disagree about the paid piracy, but I attempt to rectify that in some small way by going out and buying the albums of artists I like that I find for the first time on spotitfy.
Back in the salad days, I had my finger on the pulse of what’s going on in the music world, having worked at radio stations and living in a city that had touring acts every night of the week in venues of all sizes. Now I find most new artists from spotify. I found their algorithm that suggested new stuff based on what you chose to listen to previously to be much better than that of competitors.
And that being said, having used spotify for several years now, I do agree about the crappier format. It is harder to listen to an actual album, and there is more junk to sift through to find what you want. They have gone way overboard with algorithmic suggestions. And I do believe that they are streaming AI produced music now, so when I do find an artist I like, I make a point of searching to make sure they are actual human beings before heading to my local CD store.
What is this “Spotify” you all speak of, heh heh. Seriously though, why does Spotify exist? Because we need an endless soundtrack? Because it’s simpler to use? Because our masters decided that all of our experiences must come through our phones? Not for me, thanks.
I didn’t understand the whining. Works very well for me. Just a few weeks ago a non user challenged me to find stuff on Spotify that he said wasn’t there, and that’s why he didn’t use it. He has fringe tastes. They were all there, with one search. And if the author wants to find albums and such, it’s easy.
Pity the poor artist, but they’ve been ripped off since the beginning of time. At least they don’t have to deal with mobsters today.
Mobsters paid well. And provided a lot more work for musicians than their overworld equivalents.
Not really. Paid themselves, maybe, and provided some excellent drugs.
Spitify makes more money on tracking you, then selling your personal information to data brokers, than it does with subscriptions and such. Anyone who uses spitify is being duped and conned.
You know, I really don’t care they’re telling people I like the Brian Jonestown Massacre.
Off subject, but I saw the 2004 documentary “Dig” and was highly entertained.
well, Spotify doesn’t have the Pain Teens’ album, Born in Blood, but I’ve been trying to overlook that…
“No, Boeing Starliner’s NASA astronauts are not stranded in space. Here’s why.”
Nice try with this article but I am more ready to believe a story of how Kamala Harris is being readied to undertake a flight mission as an astronaut to bring those two people home aboard a re-conditioned Space Shuttle. Make a good movie though.
Not the first such article we’ve had pushing the same message.
Lethem wrote about astronauts stranded in a space station thanks to failing technology in Chronic City.
Trolling around on the YT yesterday and rumbled through several reviews from the Critical Drinker…one of them was about such a topic, a space traveling crew and ship somehow stranded near planet Neptune. Event Horizon. What a very unique movie that was.
He also did a review for Deadpool and Wolverine….less than glowing review according to him.
Musical interlude:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYYRH4apXDo
The Mearsheimer talk with Napolitano will be five hours after Nasrallah speaks at the funeral of Shukur. There’s a chance Mearsheimer will have to comment events that will be happening as they stream.
Israel has bombed and shelled villages in southern Lebanon today, but Hezbollah has not fired back. There are some indications Hezbollah is making preparations for an actual war breaking out. Southern Lebanese inhabitants are reporting constant buzz of Israeli observation drones.
Iranians are today meeting with representatives from Lebanon, Iraq and Yemen to discuss about the retaliation while Iran has announced yesterday it has no intention of intensifying the conflict.
Some hours ago the funeral of Haniyah in Tehran was a apparently a rarely seen presentation of Shia-Sunni unity against a common enemy.
A BBC ‘journalist’ interviewed a Lebanese politician in Beirut yesterday. He simply turned a deaf ear to everything the guy said about the desperate situation and the indiscrimante Israeli bombing by continuously interjecting ‘but what about Hezbollah’. It was absolutely pathetic but typical of BBC reporting – regurgatated Israeli propaganda.
The missus and I are on European vacation for a few more days. I’ve been largely unplugged and marked safe from greasy, fake AI, having escaped from the tar pit of Atlanta’s airport by the skin of our teeth during the CrowdSuck fiasco Friday.
To quote the late Frank Zappa: the meek shall inherit nothing.
A few observations:
Unplugging is good for your mental health. At the airport now waiting for our flight I am catching up with the News and wishing I hadn’t.
Speaking of airports, they are much nicer and cleaner than the crapified US ones. A ham sandwich goes for around 7 Euros which is about half of the $14 I paid for one at Hartsfield-Jackson last year. So score one for Europe as the screwflation here is at least a bit subdued.
A few of the locals we encountered seemed not so thrilled about the EU. One guide in a Balkan country mentioned that they had good health care provided by the Government. Well, that’s nice, good luck keeping it! The Blackrock scum will no doubt move in and privatize that sucker.
It’s important to see how the other people live, it was largely my college education in lieu of actually going to college, traipsing around the world in search of old metal. They do things differently there.
We don’t have electricity at our cabin, and KNX 1070 news radio in LA comes in when it gets dark and then fades with sunlight-kinda like a vampire. I was listening in the wee hours to the CrowdStrike imbroglio and the panic was almost akin to the War of the Worlds, one newsreader kept checking to see online if his automatically deposited salary had been posted yet, along with other tales of whoa.
What if Delta doesn’t get the $500 million they lost on account of CS screwing up?
“What if Delta doesn’t get the $500 million they lost on account of CS screwing up?”
No more connecting flights to Jackson Hole.
…the Fed Major Major Major Majordomos would go on crowd strike?
Replace all our Medicare Meds with shares of stock.
“These shares of Davoscare LLC are redeemable for actual healthcare, with a small processing fee, at the nearest Healthcorp clinic.”
>Sen. Rand Paul questions acting Secret Service director on Trump rally shooting probe
Interesting, if tepid, questioning of SS by Paul yesterday. Mainly covering “failures in protocol.” I still don’t know much about Maxell’s Yearick and his role if any, but I can rest assured that he wasn’t the shooter according to Politifact. But who was he? What was the “white van” all about? Was Crooks the “fall guy.” So many interconnections that independent journalist are tracking down…but the country has moved on, nothing to see, just the incompetence of another gov’t bureaucracy that we’ve all been conditioned to expect and accept.
https://youtu.be/a9mmR-eElQc?si=_cv8p4HHAkrZGm19
https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2024/jul/16/instagram-posts/no-trump-rally-shooter-wasnt-maxwell-yearick/
The NYT ran an article yesterday implying that any questioning of the official narrative (what exactly is the official narrative, btw?) is officially a Conspiracy Theory. They really want to bury this event. Trump didn’t help with the is Harris black thing. That guy.
Some Republicans Embrace Conspiracy Theories on Trump Assassination Attempt https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/31/us/politics/trump-assassination-republicans-conspiracy-theories.html?smid=nytcore-android-share
My two comments were not published, of course. But, I guess it’s a conspiracy theory in my head that the NYT has a bias.
The guys at The Duran dropped a video yesterday talking about how the Democrats and the media are going to boost Kamala and make the assassination attempt on Trump drop down a memory hole-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qa6AhouqeVw (19:53 mins)
Tried an experiment right now based on reports that Google is all in on this strategy. So I started to type the words ‘assassination attempt on’ and watched what autocomplete came up with. There were ten suggestions and Trump was not mentioned in any one of them. Strange that.
As for Trump saying that it was not that long ago that Kamala identified as black, apparently on the screen behind him there was an old article where she identified herself as Indian. Then again, I saw a video montage not long ago where Biden identified at different times as belonging to a dozen different nationalities.
Rev Kev: So I started to type the words ‘assassination attempt on’ and watched what autocomplete came up with.
True, but I clicked through and links to Trump assassination-related news actually took up almost all Google’s first page.
So we may get there. But for the moment let’s not over-egg the depth of the 1984-style misrepresentation that TPTB are stuffing down our throats.
When Biden announced that the FBI was assigned to investigate the shooting, I thought, well, that’s over, and, sure enough, we get the shrapnel testimony from Wray.
It’s California Jake. Kamala can ‘identify’ as Black, and Gavin can ‘identify’ as a Getty.
You’re right, Black Bart was not only not black, but as poets go, not much.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Bart_(outlaw)
The media moves on, but the people never forget. People remember and they trust each other and their shared memories much more than they trust the media. It is easy to distract, but today’s news is tomorrow’s trash, and people share the stories which concern them and build them into a powerful motivational force to action.
In What will the comfortable classes do? Richard Murphy makes a point I think super important and applies beyond the UK: the only way to stop vicious right-wing political movements from advancing is to advance populist politics of economic justice.
It’s so obvious as to be banal, but the global elites see it the other way: the only way to stop populist economic policy is to advance vicious, right-wing political movements. It’s not the latter that threatens them but the former.
What of a compromise? A National Socialism, if you will?
It’s not so obvious to normies. I have decent, compassionate friends that think that the election of Starmer’s Labour is a big step in the right direction for the UK.
That’s a comforting thought for SIS.
Fascism is the flip side of liberalism on the capitalism coin…
Liberalism and conservatism are the two sides of the capitalist coin. The only thing you can buy with that coin is fascism.
yeah, it’s pretty much this. As long as the masses are tricked into consent, liberalism is what they get. When consent starts to slip as we are seeing more and more, the mask comes off and beneath it it’s fascism. As for differences with conservatism, I don’t see any.
A timeless quote:
He’s County, you know.
Surely the whole point of the Third Way was to oppose populism and embrace the true right’s (not the imagined right’s) voodoo economics in order to attract campaign money and put themselves in power. Their excuse was that without power no reform but of course once they attained that power it was “two legs good, four legs bad.”
An important part of this “learn nothing and forget nothing” strategy is to pretend that populist movements are the return of of Hitler since he used the Depression and the tremendous trauma of WW1 to scheme himself into power. And he did economically revive Germany before letting his psycho side and the sway of big industrialists push him into war.
So we’ve exchanged the TINA of Thatcher and Reagan for the TINA of Blair and the Clintons. Our elites seem to have a real problem trying to think outside the box but then West Wing world is mostly about the perks anyway.
The Army’s Bet….
Maybe if you tidy up the place a bit…
“For fiscal year 2022, the Pentagon’s Annual Report on Sexual Assault in the Military showed that reported incidents rose 9% in the Navy, 13% in the Air Force and 3.6% in the Marine Corps. While reports in the Army fell 9%, there were still 8,942 reports of sexual assault across the entire force.”
Re escalation in the middle east, Israel is also claiming that their hit on Deif from back in early July in Khan Younis is confirmed. They have confirmed his death numerous times already, so we shall see. It’s possible that some of the released detainees had spyware installed on their phones or somesuch to inform the IOF of a Deif visit.
Regarding the overall picture, I am more stoic about the outcome. The Chinese have a saying that goes something like, ‘who knows what is good or bad?’. It will take a long time for the smoke to clear and the dust to settle and for us to begin to do an accounting of the events.
Back in June 1941, well-meaning observers might have been terrified at the prospect of the Germans escalating the war by attacking the USSR. 20 million soviet citizens would go on to pay the ultimate price, but without Operation Barbarossa, Nazi Germany could have gone on to win the war. Whether the resulting outcome was good or bad is another matter, and goes back to the initial question: who knows? One thing we do now is that current events are just the chickens coming home to roost following European crimes from centuries past.
So onto the present day. Perhaps a greater war with Iran, Hezbollah and Syria will erupt. Perhaps this will force Russia and then China to join in. I have no idea what the human cost will be but I know it will be heavy. It won’t be up to me whether those countries decide to pay it, but if it leads to the dissolution of Israel, and perhaps even the United States of America, then so be it.
Returning to the Patrick Lawrence article from a few days ago, Israel has to go. It has to go the way of Nazi Germany and Apartheid South Africa. The successor state will be an Arab-majority democratic Palestine but there needs to be a reckoning for the genocidal elements of Israeli society without which integration will not be possible. Modern day Nuremberg trials, perhaps set in Jaffa.
I’ve had similar thoughts and conversations. The difference that makes me uneasy is that Germany in the 40s didn’t have nukes.
Yes, the price to pay is terrifying. The only consolation is that Israel can’t nuke its neighbors without also poisoning itself. But if any society is mad enough to do that, it’s Israel.
vidimi: The only consolation is that Israel can’t nuke its neighbors without also poisoning itself.
I would not be so consoled.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mordechai_Vanunu
“Mordechai Vanunu (Hebrew: מרדכי ואנונו; born 14 October 1954) …is an Israeli former nuclear technician and peace activist who, citing his opposition to weapons of mass destruction, revealed details of Israel’s nuclear weapons program … in 1986. He was subsequently lured to Italy by the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad, where he was drugged and abducted … secretly transported to Israel and ultimately convicted in a trial held behind closed doors … Vanunu spent 18 years in prison, including more than 11 in solitary confinement … Released from prison in 2004 … In 2007, Vanunu was sentenced to six months in prison for violating terms of his parole … In May 2010, Vanunu was arrested again and sentenced to three months in jail on a charge that he had met foreigners, in violation of conditions of his 2004 release from jail …American whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg has referred to him as “the preeminent hero of the nuclear era”.
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neutron_bomb
“By 1984, according to Mordechai Vanunu, Israel was mass-producing neutron bombs.”
And here in 2025, more practically ….
“All thermonuclear dial-a-yield warheads that have about 10 kiloton and lower as one dial option, with a considerable fraction of that yield derived from fusion reactions, can be considered able to be neutron bombs in use, if not in name.”
To be clear, any thermonuclear weapon — or H-bomb –is a three-stage device, with a radiation-imploded fusion second stage boosting an initial fission explosion, producing in the third stage a thermonuclear blast hundreds of times greater than an atomic bomb’s.
That enabled a great flexibility in design, which in turn permitted — to begin with — warheads miniaturized enough to be put on top of missiles, and great variance in blast yields.
Thus ….
https://www.britannica.com/technology/neutron-bomb
‘A neutron bomb … might have a yield, or explosive strength, of only one kiloton, a fraction of the 15-kiloton explosion that devastated Hiroshima, Japan, in 1945. Its blast and heat effects would be confined to an area of only a few hundred metres in radius, but within a somewhat larger radius of 1,000–2,000 metres the fusion reaction would throw off a powerful wave of neutron and gamma radiation. High-energy neutrons, though short-lived, could penetrate armour or several metres of earth and would be extremely destructive to living tissue. Because of its short-range destructiveness and the absence of long-range effects, the neutron bomb might be highly effective against tank and infantry formations on the battlefield but might not endanger nearby cities or other population centres.’
interesting, thanks.
Sobering. Does this mean we are left with concern of “letting the genie out of the bottle” as the last bulwark between us and nuclear war?
I don’t know what that means.
My immediate concern is that Biden is OTL and Harris appears uninterested (presumably uninformed) and the media is steering our attention elsewhere while Israel simultaneously pulls the trigger on a war with Hizbollah and on a war with Iran. If Israel can make either of those adversaries’ responses to the assassinations (that Israeli and Western press valorize as precision targeted strikes on terrorist leaders) seem disproportionate, criminal, genocidal or something then the West will unite behind Israel in these wars. What then does Russia do?
Genie = uncontrolled escalation.
Who’s in charge is not clear and most concerning.
Who is the trapper? Who will fall into the trap? It’s like a guy who’s only just learned to play dominoes (let’s call him Derek) competing in a three dimensional chess game against a master.
If, as they should, Israel’s politicians understand how extreme and increasingly untenable their position is and how they will be punished if they do the sane thing and de-escalate, I have a nasty feeling some would prefer to go out in a rampage that does the maximum damage to their enemies. Perhaps there’s even an eschatological angle to such a rampage, I don’t understand theology well enough to know.
Massada 2.0?
The poeple of Israel, after all are returning to form. Taking the land by vicious bloodshed and trechery and now on the process of commiting self destruction because of exceptionalism.
.Tom: Perhaps there’s even an eschatological angle to such a rampage,
Alastair Crooke’s most recent commentaries, which dropped on Monday, have stressed that: firstly, this eschatological mindset has indeed taken over in “decision-making circles” in Tel Aviv and among much of the Israeli population; and that, secondly, they want war on the largest possible scale and to that end they intend to try to pull the US in.
Alastair Crooke on Judge Napolitano: Will there be war in Lebanon?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDERjMb3ZIs
Crooke in Strategic Culture
https://strategic-culture.su/news/2024/07/29/is-there-a-risk-that-kamala-harris-might-go-soft-on-foreign-policy/
‘Netanyahu also insists that Israel needs the support and practical assistance of the ‘free world’ ‘to counter the regime at the heart of the existential threat – Iran’. What if Iran intervenes in Lebanon in response to a massive Israeli assault? Netanyahu casts this as the ‘barbarians’ coming for western civilisation – coming too for America as much as Israel ….
‘Of course, hitting out at Iran is entirely a different proposition. And that’s why Netanyahu is seeking U.S. support … There is a photograph of Netanyahu and his wife aboard the Wing of Zion (the new Israeli State aircraft) with a MAGA-style baseball cap on the desk beside him, only it is blue, not red, and is emblazoned with two words: “Total Victory”.
‘“Total Victory” plainly is Israel ‘winning together, with the U.S., in confronting Iran’s axis of evil’: Is the U.S. aboard? Or are U.S. foreign policy circles so distracted by the extraordinary succession events cascading out in the U.S. and Ukraine that the élites cannot, at the same time, attend to Bibi’s “crossroads of history”? We shall see.’
“is it good? is it bad?”
I hope a “good thing” happens as a result of all this bad. The end of israel.
That would be a monumental change to the structure of the west. And I think for the better.
No longer would the stain of zionism have a home. If Israel is in the process of destroying itself by its unrestrained aggression, at a time when all its neighbors have had enough. The bully on the bloc, may just get run off. Despite what the west “wants”. After all, the west has to “do” something about it. just like they want to do something in ukraine, but can’t.
hopefully, It would be a good thing in the middle east, for the people that live there to not have to deal with the belligerent zionists.
But in the US, (I could dream)
The end of the zionist state. the end of when israel exists…. hopefully will be a blow to all the christian zionists who still keep their dream alive, as the country of israel is on the earth. If it wasn’t anymore, maybe more people will begin to get their heads out of the clouds and deal with the problems down here on earth.
That would be a wonderful turn of the “is it good? is it bad” wheel of life.
“if it leads to the dissolution of Israel, and perhaps even the United States of America, then so be it”
Uh, since I live in the US I can’t share your fatalism and I don’t think the Zionist rump in this country shares it either which is why you finally see significant Jewish opposition to Israel. What Austin really said was that the US will help “defend” Israel which means shooting down Iranian missiles as they did a couple of months ago.
But our Pentagon is running out of munitions and is very very afraid of still more embarrassment by having their expensive and mostly useless aircraft carriers sunk. And perhaps the better takeaway from the Netanyahu visit is the considerable Congressional faction that skipped out.
Even Trump reportedly told Netanyahu at Mar a Lago that he should get the crisis over quickly which is the opposite of Netanyahu’s goal–as just proven–because it would mean the political end of him. Here’s suggesting that the US is not on board with war in Iran and that goes for both parties if not the wacky Mike Johnson. What Iran does next remains to be seen. But they too are aware of Bibi’s game and have so far resisted.
To be clear, I don’t mean a destruction of the US, but a break up into smaller pieces. De-imperialism can actually be a benefit to regular folks as the governments would be able to pursue things like infrastructure and healthcare instead.
I would say there is NO chance of the US breaking up. There is no demarcation line. red and blue live in mixed communities all over.
Besides the federal system is actually a strength, regardless of what people imagine. Especially since it has been a fact on the ground for better than 150 years.
we all use the same money. the big corporations would never let their minions complicate business as usual.
“Ukraine’s Zelensky says he wants Russia ‘at the table’ for next peace summit”
That’s going to be a neat trick. Zelensky changed the Ukrainian constitution so that it is illegal to negotiate with a Putin government. Even if he does, the Nazis have already told him that they will kill him if he tries to do so. And on what basis will he negotiate about? His 10 point peace plan which the Russians rejected on sight? Putin’s recent offer? Apparently he wants it held near when the US elections are to be held so likely the whole point of the conference would be to make the Russians look bad and generate good headlines for the Democrats to use in their political campaign. And for some reason, Zelensky still thinks that he can get China to order Russia to halt this war. Meanwhile he must be sweating bullets at the thought of Trump winning in November.
Pay-per-view opportunity, where Victoria Nuland and some of her gov friends have to watch from the gallery. Preferably bound and gagged. /:
Z must be planning his exit plan.
If there is a peace a grateful and shrunken Ukraine won’t look kindly at the leader who destroyed so many lives and property. If there is no peace then how does Z create a future victory?
Where does Z go? Who provides the security?
Why Zelensky will be made the Leader in Exile and will be supported financially by the west where he will be head of the Ukrainian resistance. And he still has who know how much cash stashed away. He will do very well then you very much. Maybe he and Boris can do podcasts together where they will explain how they tried to create peace in the Ukraine but were tricked by the Russians.
Interesting that he wasn’t at the games in Paris. It’s not as though he hasn’t traveled a lot and recently, and that the war just started going badly. Maybe the Nazis have him on house arrest of some sort, in country. He has to train out to Poland to fly anywhere, a long with everyone else in Kiev. He should secretly negotiate with Putin for an air escape.
I had really hoped that he would have been the secret final torch bearer in the opening ceremony. It would have been *chef’s kiss*
Sounds about right. Best case scenario, I suppose.
I wonder how his exit would work in practical terms.
He can’t call to any country leader and say ”hey, dude, would you mind helping me flee these nazis? I pop in in a few weeks. Be ready with a taxi to a great place where I can spend my loot.” because his communication is surveilled so he would be executed by the ukronazis before getting on the plane out of Ukraine. This would also be the danger using messengers whose loyalties may be based in Lvov.
He can’t just crash a summit or surprise visit a leader and say ”yo, surprise, here I am! I need to crash at your place for a while. Ok with you?” What is the process for such an unprepared demand?
Who would take him? For EU that would acknowledging that this stupid war against Russia would be lost since he is fleeing. Also I think that, nobody in the EU needs him as anything other than the useful idiot role he is playing now in Ukraine. EU is stuffed with other useful idiots working on their plans to destroy Europe. I don’t think useful idiots are keen on taking care of other useful idiots not carrying their weight.
Would Biden even understand who Zelensky is nowaday? How would Kamala Harris process such a request. What would China or Russia say? Any African country?
Anyway, imagine these little scenarios is comedy. A cocaine addicted, little vermin that has sent at least half a million of his countrymen into an unneecessary death after having run for president as a peace candidate and a Jew fronting for Nazis, isn’t he the guest from hell? I guess, he will be accepted in the US or Canada. They did import loads of unsavoury people after the WWIi. In Canada maybe ha can work on their euthanasia programs. He does have experience in killing people en masse.
Ah, but he hasn’t done any killing personally. He has had to rely on the neo-nazi goons around him, and seriously, could he find Ukrainian Nazis in Canada?
He would have to forego his residuals on ‘servant of the people’ and have to cough for green zone level perimeter security in miami (or elsewhere).
I think he’s probably got Saakashvili on a retainer as his life coach.
That cat has way more lives than nine.
Trees & Trunk; He can’t just crash a summit or surprise visit a leader and say ”yo, surprise, here I am! I need to crash at your place for a while …” Who would take him?
Javier Milei in Argentina?
After all, Argentina does have form
I imagine he was provided with a secure sat phone.
However, he would be considering the Brits or Americans wanting to off him since he knows too much, has probably expressed resentment, is assessed by his handlers as feeling betrayed by them, which he was. The moment he goes into exile his usefulness has ended and he’s a loose thread needing to be tidied up before he writes his memoirs.
Caught between a rock (the west) and a hard place (the ukronazis) the only party with a vested interest in keeping him alive, and the only honorable party, are the Russians.
Zelensky will more than likely end up in the U.S. with the taxpayers picking up the tab for his security. It’s the least we can do for the loyal lapdog who sacrificed his country for a neocon wet dream.
…and he be a real hit for fundraisers for the dream that will never die:
neocons forever!
humans never!
It is extraordinary how reproductive parasites can persist.
Darwin had it right, the fit is all, and they are confident in their environmental control.
But how would that work? Blinken/Sullivan/the Cookie Monster send a plane unannounced with a team of marines to shoot any nazis trying to off zeleensky and pick him up? Or he shows up in congress and say ”gimme money and a shelter”?
He could always abscond on one of his fundraising trips to DC.
I’m sure Z has family back in Ukraine while he’s allowed to ‘travel’.
Israel. Zelensky goes to Israel. He fits like a glove.
Mother Nature’s punching bag
Orange dots are buildings.
Yellow is river corridor
A ski mountain in Vermont:
I tried to include a link to a 3D look, but the link failed
https://mfs2.github.io/Ludlow/
Would you be pointing out that it’s maybe not a good idea to focus development in seasonal drainages?
Living in Upstate NY, I am not intimate with the situation in the areas flooding in Vermont, however I believe much of the building in ‘seasonal drainages’ — whatever you mean by that designation — may have been completed 50 – 100 years ago when the Earth was a very different place. Many of the homes in rural Upstate are over 100 years old. One hundred years ago homes on rivers and streams in valleys were seldom threatened by atmospheric rivers. If you were building a home where do you believe you would be most likely to be able to dig a well? valley floor or mountainside? — and do not forget the rock nearer the surface of a mountainside.
All true. My unspoken point was that the map that Frank put up describes virtually all of Vermont. As you conservatively note, and I agree, most of those structures have been there for a long time. (I’d reckon a good number of them nearing or have crossed the 200 yo mark.) So here we are, and what to do?
Seasonal drainages, if I can remember it as taught to me at Outward Bound and NOLS, refers to exactly that. In the slopes of the Maasai Mara, what are trickling brook beds during the dry season become raging torrents during the wet season. In VT these normally semi dry conduits swell as they service the melting snowpack during the spring.
I can assure you that the ski slopes and associated Condos and etc are not 100 years old. Some of those may be 50, but many are much younger.
Thanks for the clarification. I’d forgotten it’s a “ski town”.
Seasonal drainages are radically transformed by structures (housing and other impervious surfaces). The legendary Luna Leopold discovered that a mere 10% increase in impervious surface substantially increases flooding potential in a natural drainage. See: A View of the River (2005).
I was not very clear in making my point. That which made sense 100, 50, even 10[?] years ago no longer makes sense. Existing housing in the u.s. is scarce where it’s needed and prohibitively expensive for most of the Populace. Existing home designs poorly fit the needs of the changing Populace and the radically altered environment as the Age of Petroleum slowly comes to its end. In rural areas housing tends to be very old, built for a time when families were much larger and a dining room and parlor were class signifiers. Relatively inexpensive wood, fuel oil and coal warmed the ill-insulated houses. Electricity, indoor toilets, and tap water were innovations. Most houses have two stories, one for family life and the upstairs for bed rooms. Houses, towns, cities were built and grew to suit the requirements of a different way of life at a time of different opportunity and potential. What will become of rural areas when creeks that never rose past their channels in the last two hundred years receive the rainfall of a lingering atmospheric river and begin cresting along small town Mainstreet? How will people now so accustomed to driving their big pick-up trucks between distant towns adapt to the rapid increase in the costs of distance as gasoline prices begin their climb toward the time when the fracking wells play out? It is very romantic to imagine a return to horse culture as in the 19th century. I do not believe it is a realistic expectation.
Much of the newer housing adheres to building codes, zoning restrictions, and government controls mandating the use of materials and construction techniques developed for primarily for present time profits with suitability, durabiliy, low heating/cooling, maintenance and repair costs regarded as significantly lesser considerations left to the realms of marketing, and advertising. The newer housing does little to replace older housing. In my opinion almost all of the newer housing serves city people buying second homes or moving to the country to take advantage of remote work in some city center. These new comers poorly fit into the communities they have moved to, and worse, they seem to expect country life to adapt to their expectations, needs, and wishes.
I cannot imagine how the big u.s. cities can adapt to what the future holds. Rural America has some ability to adapt to this future. The large cities have shown their mettle on those increasing frequent occasions when power stops flowing through the electric Grid. Many of the big cities in the u.s. rely on the stability of coastlines that are inexorably moving inland. Many of the big cities rely on reservoirs and ground water threatened with souring as salt waters seep into the water tables. The u.s. Elites have positioned the nation for a bitter awakening when foreign goods and resources stop flowing into the u.s. from abroad, and stop flowing through transportation channels as diesel slows its flow. Little is still “Made in the USA”. Cities are often surrounded by communities of suburban homes zoned to serve as bedroom communities reliant on the automobile. Housing in the big cities will be of greatest concern to those sea creatures who manage to survive the ongoing extinctions, and some of the land wildlife that might find at least temporary shelter in the abandoned city buildings. I do not want to imagine how the people in the big cities will make their adjustment to the times to come. I doubt it will be a pretty picture.
Okemo is lame. As long as Killington is ok, we’re fine.
Tough 13 months for Vermont–as Bernie reminds even us non-residents:
https://outreach.senate.gov/iqextranet/iqClickTrk.aspx?&cid=SenSanders&crop=18041.119090736.12700978.1120359&report_id=&redirect=https%3a%2f%2fyoutu.be%2fBSk9wkPtUCU&redir_log=96973442245189
The forthright talk about the Climate Crises effect is refreshingly honest.
I do not believe my boyz Lindsey and Timmy are allowed to acknowledge anything like that–and Ralph thinks it’s all a hoax.
Here is what some troublemakers have been up to and are doing up(for us) in NYC at CitiBanc:
stopthemoneypipeline.com
https://www.nationofchange.org/2024/07/29/moms-and-kids-demand-end-to-fossil-fuel-funding-at-citigroup-ceos-home/?emci=41052d19-af4d-ef11-86c3-6045bdd9e096&emdi=496542bf-c14d-ef11-86c3-6045bdd9e096&ceid=1112545
and some music to accompany, if you happen to be in the vicinity:
https://www.summerofheat.org/cello?link_id=0&can_id=dff7b9dd67661998dd2643155951ebb8&source=email-we-will-defy-citibanks-attempts-to-intimidate-us&email_referrer=email_2404793&email_subject=we-will-defy-citibanks-attempts-to-intimidate-us
It would be a shame if Ismail Haniyeh did not know that Israel has a long history of assassinating Hamas negotiators. He might have lived longer had he not made peace proposals.
Excellent/detailed long comment on polling/survey companies, here:
https://old.reddit.com/r/ireland/comments/1egt4gu/more_than_a_fifth_of_voters_believe_government_is/lfxmcno/?context=3
US native-born fertility went under 2.0 in the early 70’s….with a brief respite in the 90’s with higher fertility of 1st generation immigrants/migrants.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/SPDYNTFRTINUSA
1/5 of voters aren’t wrong per se. This is more an indictment on the horrific economic damage caused within the US during the 70’s and 80’s and the tremendous externalities from the social changes during the 1960’s.
The Spice must flow.
I note with wry amusement that the Bloomberg expose on the gaming of the H-1b vis program features unironically as the worthy but wronged applicant (as is pro forma in the genre) an individual who devised a LITERALLY rent-seeking app/program — that is to say a borderline collusive economic rent seeking device for actual landlords/rentiers!
This ought to tell you something about how irretrievably rotten is the state of general economic understanding among the business public … 🤦♂️
Lol, how very Bloomberg of them.
AI will solve that problem by maximizing the rent transfer. Combine the right incentives and handouts in that optimal way, too bad about the taxpayers and those applicants.
Is there a Goldman, a SPAC or an ETF sponsor working on further monetization? /s
From Folkway to Art: The Transformation of Quilts JSTOR. I love quilts. I hate the “We are rich and entitled and because we’ve said so these are now art” tone. Do click through to the Whitney for some photos from the exhibit. Quilts do look good on a wall if you’ve got a wall big enough. My favorite is the silver with broad diagonal orange stripes, the pattern commonly referred to as “log cabin”.
I love quilts, too. The traditional ones are my favorites, sewn by using scraps of fabric from old clothes, etc. I inherited a quilt my grandmother made during the Great Depression. It’s a “wedding ring” pattern with a multitude of ditsy floral prints and a solid bright yellow fabric in the center of each ring.
For years, I kept the quilt packed safely away, thinking it was too special to use. Shortly after I was diagnosed and knew I didn’t have much time left, I took it out and started using it on the bed everyday. It cheers me and the cat loves it.
Is it art or folkways craft? Doesn’t matter to me. It’s simply beautiful.
Oooh, your quilt (and your cat) sounds beautiful. I love bright shades of yellow as a major flavor. I’ve one that I gave to MsSyk’s mom in the pickle dish pattern that uses a rich marigold color as the major. She keeps it on her bed, and it gives me great joy every time I see it there.
Re: Sick cat
I want to thank the very nice person at NC who recommended giving my sick cat some chicken liver every day along with her regular food. I started doing that a few weeks ago and she is so much better! It’s easy to do, so if other people are struggling with sick kitties, definitely give it a try.
Hi Lena,
I never heard about your sick cat until now so it was not me but I kept my Siamese alive on pureed chicken livers (just squashed by hand in a plastic bag) for months when she was otherwise skin and bone. I hope your cat responds as long!
I don’t know where we learnt that, she had always liked them and it was all she would eat at that stage (such a strong taste to stimulate the appetite) and with great quantities of amino acids etc for cats with poor absorption. Perhaps our family vet had suggested it with one of the other cats or it was just my mother’s good instincts.
Are these cooked or raw chicken livers?????
Not raw chicken livers! I boil them, then cut them up into very small pieces, mash it and mix with her Fancy Feast Chicken Paté. It supplements her regular food but doesn’t replace it because that would be giving her too much fat. She is gaining weight and has more energy, less pain now. She is sleeping better. I’ve read that some people bake chicken livers for their cats. I think either way, boil or bake, is fine. If you boil them, you can save some of the ‘broth’ to moisten the food.
Thank you very much. I do not have a lot of cat contact; I have dogs; but I definitely have friends with cats and this sounds like an important way of keeping them nourished if they are in bad shape. This has now been put in that part of my brain. I am so glad that it is helping your small furry person.
For dogs- my mom owned a kennel when I was growing up. She had a ‘bring ’em back from the edge of death’ recipe: liver, brown rice and broccoli. It’s amazing.
Ten years ago we found a quilt in my late mothers’ possessions, made and passed down by my great, great (I don’t know how many greats) grandmother. She made it after escaping from the Wyoming Valley (Pa.) Massacre, 1778, and passed away in 1832. I’d heard about the “escape from an Indian massacre in Wyoming”, but had always understood it to be during the migration out West, not during the Revolutionary War. It also included British troops and Tory civilians. She was spared, and fled on a broken down horse, pregnant and with six children, to Connecticut, and then to Vermont.
It is a rather thin quilt, almost more a spread, perhaps, and though I don’t know the name of the pattern, is quite plain. What I find most interesting about it is that it is made of scraps of lightweight machine woven cotton in yellow/orange/brown patterned shirt fabrics. English made or domestic fabric, it’s a relic of the transition from hand-made to machine-made.
What you are describing sounds like it could be an early coverlet woven on a Jacquard loom. The patterns on these coverlets are often quilt-like but they are not quilted. They are thin woven spreads usually made of cotton and wool yarns but also sometimes linen. I am not able to link here but if you search for ‘antique Jacquard coverlets’, you can find pictures and see if your heirloom is one rather than a quilt. They can date back to the early 1800’s and be quite valuable.
It’s definitely a pieced quilt, not Jacquard, made from mostly everyday/shirting fabric. I don’t argue with my wife (about that, at least).
We’re on holiday for another week, but when we get home I’d be happy to take a picture and send it to you, if I knew where?
I wish I could see it. A quilt with a history, particularly family history, is a remarkable thing indeed.
We’re on the shores of Lake Michigan, basking in the humidity. When we get home to California in a week, I’ll take some pictures and offer them for posting. Barring that I’ll spell out my email and you and Lena can contact me directly?
My Depression-era gran made quilts for my sis and I when we were born. Recovering from a traumatic five weeks in the hospital I brought it out and slept under it. It was like having her hand on my forehead.
I once made a wall quilt for a niece who had a huge wall space, just crying out for a quilt(or so I believed). I presented it to her and remarked about the wall.
“it’s going on a bed, Aunt Marie” end on my designer wall quilt career
Yes, we have the gentrification of quilts apparently.
The entitled, smug Professional Managerial Caste know everything.
But it has been said, and I agree, that they do not know yet that for the oligarchs in their rapacious devouring of the planet, the PMC will become dessert.
Which is a worry for us who have PMC kids.
“Storming Sde Teiman, Far-right Lawmakers Try to Inject Chaos Into the Israeli Army”
‘The sad truth is that the deranged murderousness demonstrated by Hamas in the October 7 massacre has dragged Israel down into a vicious circle of violence and revenge.’
No, they have it wrong. That whole attack succeeded in showing the whole world who the Israelis really are with their homicidal tendencies and inability to remember the genocide that was done against themselves. For decades now the Israelis have been using the Holocaust as something to browbeat other nations with but those days are gone. Nobody will care anymore because of the genocide they are committing against the Palestinians in a fashion not seen since the Bronze Age. And people are now seeing the IDF for what they really are and not ‘the most moral army in the world.’ Had a thought today that won’t go away and that is the idea that Israel may be nothing more than a 21st century Crusader State-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crusader_states
They too were backed by the power of the west but now they are long gone. And as far as I can see, the way that the present state of Israel is constituted is simply not sustainable and I could easily see a civil war breaking out in the years to come between the seculars and the ultra-right. Dark times ahead for Israel.
That may never have happened if it wasn’t for the 65 or so standing Os from our congress scum. We’ve got their back.
What I want to know is which US State will be given to the Zionist refugees as their “Diaspora Homeland?” [All the non-Jewish ‘locals’ will be moved out to accommodate the ‘new arrivals.’ What to call it? Think Tradition. Babylon!]
“By the rivers of Hoboken, there we sat down, yea, we wept when we remembered Zion.”
Damn near everything in Utah tends to be named Zion/s, and they claim to be tribal members…
True, but does a river run through it? (It does have a super saline lake, I’ll give it that.)
Yes, the Virgin River. At the start of the Narrows when the sun is low, the river reflects copper and gold from canyon walls – absolutely beautiful.
What to call it? Ask Jessie Jackson.
Hmmm… I’m old enough to get that reference. (Mixing Greek Pantheon Gods with Middle Eastern pastoral Thunder Gods is quite the stretch. However, in theology, anything is possible.)
Well, they already have a pretty substantial foothold in the refugee camps of Hollywood and West Palm Beach.
Americans are getting poorer and poorer, so the Army should learn to wait instead of spending big bucks on silly ads. Sooner or later we will see a long line of young men at the recruiting office.
The Army can do us all a favour and begin using resources to rebuild America’s infrastructure. A new fangled CCC. Then new recruits can feel good about serving once more. The country will benefit for once from the massive “Defense Department” budget.
Seriously, couple this with the return of old fashioned “pork barrel” spending and watch the country grow stronger. Use “corruption” for some good purpose. It would be a “win win” situation.
This makes so much sense, too much to ever happen here. Imagine a large organized force of young men and women maintaining our parks, our infrastructure, responding to disasters, etc. How about forest maintenance? Manually controlling pests like emerald ash and bark beetles. The bonus of course is it will be the best job they ever had. (YCC was the best job I ever had. Getting paid to camp in and maintain Baxter Park for a summer. Imagine.)
Why did they all of a sudden keep track of these 11 millions but not the billions spent in other places?
“Corruption” is not about sharing wealth with the many, it is about concentrating it in the hands of the few. Any policy that does not enrich Lockheed Martin or Raytheon will be opposed.
This because elected officials no longer need their constituents financial support. Lockheed Martin and Raytheon now have that covered thanks to citizens united. It’s amusing to catch myself feeling nostalgic for the corruption of yore.
Yes, but imagine if Raytheon Martin were to build mass transit in the bigger cities. The return of street rail, regular “green” bus service, interurban rail, etc. Then Oligarch Inc. can get a bit wealthier and avoid the messy potential of a system wide collapse and resulting loss of “Valuable” lives due to mob actions. {Light poles are multi-use infrastructure.}
Physical fitness has been mentioned as a big issue.
I could see the USA doing what some countries are doing and recruiting from prisons.
Prisoners have a rep for getting buff.
Suspicious data pattern in recent Venezuelan election
None of that stuff in that lnk makes any sense to me whatsoever. All the votes will always add up to 100% of the votes cast. To call this suspicious is, well, weird.
It appears to be a tautology, followed by some gobbledegook. Now I’m suspicious of columbia.edu and wonder what spooks might be working there trying to “blind us with science”.
Now I’m suspicious of columbia.edu You should be, even though the obvious culprit in this case is poor methodology. From the paper(?), Let’s do the exercise. Let’s start with the total number of votes and assign 51.2% of the votes to Maduro, 44.2% to his main opponent, and 4.6% to the rest of the field, to see where that gets us: Surely those numbers are rounded, no? By not using the true percentage, one is going to get non-whole numbers. I like this bit as well, from the opening, Amid strong allegations of fraud in the recent Venezuelan elections, a curious “statistical” fact, that by itself seems to be a strong indicator of blatant fraud, has been thrown around lately on Twitter. This is the language of someone with a drum to beat. I hope the author “Andrew” isn’t a stats prof.
“Andrew” is Andrew Gelman, perhaps one of the best-known Bayesian statisticians in the wold at the moment. He also is a political scientist.
I had to read the article twice (and plow through the comments), but I think I finally get it.
A key point to keep in mind is that while the % can have infinite decimal places, the votes must always be whole integers. One voter, one vote.
Maduro with 5,150,092 whole integer votes looks legit on the surface, as does the published 51.2% of the total votes (10,058,774 whole integers). But when you do the math (5150092/10058774), you don’t get 51.2%, you get 51.1999971, which is mighty weirdly close to 51.2% and might arouse our suspicions straight away, but being patient and skeptical, we withhold judgment and turn our attention to his opponent……
Gonzalez with 4,445,978 whole integer votes looks legit, as does the published 44.2% of the total votes. But when you do the math (4445978/10058774), you don’t get 44.2%, you get 44.199989%, which is weirdly close to 44.2%, and should IMMEDIATELY arouse our suspicions, because what are the odds that these two candidates would each receive vote totals that BOTH came so vanishingly close to this single decimal point % of the total votes? No way.
Go ahead and do the math for the third ‘candidate’ (‘others’). Ditto.
Or think of it this way: looking at all previous elections worldwide involving more than two candidates, how many have ever ended with vote counts that lead to percentages that round themselves so closely to the first decimal digit? I’m guessing never. Because it’s ridiculously unlikely.
What’s amusing is that this fiddling with the votes (assuming that these election numbers are correct, I don’t follow Venezuelan politics) becomes apparent simply by using a calculator and basic math and common sense. Couldn’t these people kick over the traces more competently? It’s so clumsy that I even wonder if it was done deliberately, in order to discredit Maduro. Or maybe cheating is just harder to get away with nowadays.
Yes. Here to correct my comment from above. The critique is the (Im)possibility that all three candidates received vote counts that were very close to the single decimal point. My apologies to Andrew.
My wife will handle methods from here on out.
All these assassinations are casting aspersions on Israel, but having nearly no credibility left, there are only crumbs to criticize.
Really hope this lovely book has some traction and one day it will be rare to hear someone say they only eat fish “for the environment” while I bite my tongue instead of asking if they catch it themselves with a pole or a casting net.
From Why I Finally Quit Spotify
Yeah, why wouldn’t anyone not complain about them? They’re generally geared towards what is best for the company, not you. And today, you have to worry about COVID brain damage causing an update to brick your system. That might not be common today, but I expect it shall become more routine in the coming decade.
Keep backups! (Assuming you can ultimately restore from them.)
I never bought into the whole streaming thing; if the company licenses the music, you don’t really have access to it forever, do you? I hadn’t given the UI might thought, but you’re also held hostage there.
A follow-up to the Southport (UK) kid murders at Taylor Swift party then anti Muslim/immigrant rioting story from a few days back.
The judge released the identity of the accused. He is not Muslim, but is an immigrant. He released the name because of the riots (and also because the kid turns 18 in a week and would then be able to be identified anyway).
I think the fact that he is a black immigrant will still be enough to get the racists frothing at the mouth again. Although clearly they’d prefer if he were Muslim
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/article/2024/aug/01/southport-accused-named-as-axel-rudakubana
He was actually the son of immigrants, unless you consider Cardiff to not be a part of the UK. (Would that it were so! The Welsh likely wouldn’t have to be in NATO!)
There’s a disingenuousness about race and immigration in the main political parties and media in the UK. It is simply not allowed to question the benefits of mass immigration. There have been 1m legal immigrants to the UK in a handful of recent years compared with decades previously that never reached that number when the BNP etc were pushing their foul views.
This is an immense shift that nobody asked for and is causing working class competition for shelter and public services because there has been no increase in public investment. The competition is breeding great resentment, of the gatekeepers of the discourse as much as of the immigrants. It is not racist to conflate the decline in living standards with immigration.
My own view is that the UK should honour its asylum obligations (as in the case of this youth’s parents) but should pause legal migration indefinitely until the policy consequences have been worked through in public: who, how many, from where and from how long….
Don’t look now, but its gonna rain for a fortnight in Tallahassee starting tomorrow, wow!
Kind of the flip side to our fortnight of hellishly dry heat~
I’ve been to Tallahassee. Two weeks of rain would be an improvement.
I hear ya. I once spent 2 weeks in the space of an afternoon in Fresno.
That wasn’t you at the Mycology Cos-play Experience, was it?
No, thankfully I was @ Economic-Con in Humrodor instead, I went as William McChesney Martin, Jr. and my bettor half was a punchbowl.
Pension Funds Are Hooked on Private Equity, No Matter the Risks – Bloomberg
“If ever there was a time to rethink PE allocations, now would be it. Does the move by Texas Teachers show institutional investors are growing impatient with the sector? No, it’s the old story of “can’t live with ’em, can’t live without ’em.” The rigid mathematics of actuaries clashing with the hardball politics of pension funding make PE indispensable for most public pension funds, however much criticism showers down on the managers.”
I didn’t see any compelling reason for the pension funds to go deeper down the PE rabbit hole. I guess I need more description of the “hardball politics” that “make PE indispensable”.
“The 2.5% annual advantage of private over public equity was justified in the first decade of the 21st century. Private outperformed public equity by a compounded 5.56% per year from 2001 to 2010, according to a study of pension fund allocations to PE by investment adviser Cliffwater. But in the following 10 years, the advantage dropped to 1.17%. While PE did well in the Covid-19 recovery years of 2021 and 2022, it underperformed public stocks by 16.7% in 2023 (due to reporting lags of both PE funds and pension funds, we don’t have much data yet for 2024).”
Should “beating the market” even be the goal of pension funds? That sounds like a big part of the PE pitch.
And now the funds throw money at this trap because they are in a trap.
“…In my view, which I think is common among investment professionals, historical PE returns were heavily dependent on either low interest rates or low public equity valuations…”
I wonder how long the day of reckoning can be held back for all the zombie businesses and cons propped up by criminally low interest rates.
Something is going on. Prisoner swaps are usually part of negotiations.
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/russia-agrees-free-evan-gershkovich-paul-whelan-multi/story?id=112446743
IIRC, Gershkovich’s status was a point of JRT criticism of JRB during The Debate. Perhaps this is nothing more than election-year politics; DJT won’t be able to win EG’s release on his first day in office, he having already been released during the JRB administration.
Re Fox/Howard Kurz on Trump at NABJ–Kurz seems to think Trump’s “is she black’ comment is some kind of gaffe but I’m not so sure. If one sees the unlikely Trump phenom as a quest for at least some kind of authenticity then his remarks are perfectly consistent and likely to play better with voters than swamp dwellers reaching for the smelling salts. It’s well know that Axelrod shaped the Obama campaign around identity and was selling that far more than the little known senator’s politics. Now it’s Obama the sequel or so they hope (and so Obama hopes?). The Harris bandwagon may start to hit some ruts.
We’ll see. Only Trump could pull that off. Google may have the best answer, owning the search numbers all about Harris’s identity and family history right now. Could be millions, thinking, huh? But, at the same time, takes the spotlight off the assassination. But that first and blood and flag image, if used well, should cover that.
Due Dissidence, utube, ~25+ minutes.
‘White Women’, ‘White Dudes’ For Kamala BREAK CRINGE METER
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yj91H-JGGDc
It seemed clear Trump’s goal was to be as disrespectful as possible to the NABJ as a way to shore up his standing with his racist MAGA base. He wants to reassure them his aim is to keep black people in their place. He had no intention of trying to tack to the center now that he has the nomination.
Uncle Sugar in the mornin’
Uncle Sugar in the evenin’
Uncle Sugar at suppertime
Be my little meshuggah
And arm me (arm me)
All (all all all)
The time
Sugartime
Sugartime
Sugartime
“Israel Is Already Over” Alon Mizrahi
“…Israel may still appear to be functioning for a while, but it is mostly brain dead (its Air Force and PR departments are all that remain, and they, too, are on life support ). It has a pulse but no cognition, judgment, or will. All it would take to finish it is one healthy nudge or one semi-serious blow. It has very little life remaining in it, and zero vitality. For most intents and purposes, and especially morally and politically, Israel is already over.”
Not so over that they can’t continue a genocide.
I’m sure the next version of the state ( still surrounded by countries full of people it doesn’t respect) will have some use for the countries that continue to support it.
As I intimated above, the next “State of Israel” will probably be the former New Jersey. As you observe, it will be “…surrounded by countries full of people it doesn’t respect…”
“By the waters of Hoboken, there we sat down…”
It’s all shaping up to this:
The Palestinians and many others will be dead and more lands taken. But Israel is going to be ignored, so that will be all that’s coming to them.
The diaspora will never let Israel be too broke.
I’m afraid that Alon Mizrahi will be surprised how long Israel will muddle through as it stands now (to borrow an idiom from Dear Olde Blighty). Unless of course, larger events intervene. As Nero Wolfe told Archie Goodwin in Fer de Lance, the first novel of the series, “It is always wiser, when there is a choice, to trust to inertia. It is the greatest force in the world.”
One bubble makes your assets larger
And irrational exuberance makes your savings small
And the ones that Greenspan gave us
Don’t do anything at all
Go ask Alan
When the dominoes fall
And if you go chasing bubbles
And you know they’re going to fall
Tell ’em a put stroking nonagenarian
Has given you the call
Call Alan
When the market goes into a flat-spin stall
When the men on the Fed board
Get up in Jackson Hole
And you’ve just had some kind of mushroom
And your mind is moving low
Go ask Alan
I think he’ll know
When logic and proportion
Have fallen sloppy dead
And the White Knight is talking backwardation
And Dow Jonestown agrees “full speed ahead!”
Remember what Ayn’s acolyte said:
“Heed the Fed. Heed the Fed. Heed the Fed”
White Rabbit, performed by Molly Tuttle and Golden Highway
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LeHlvXvG6vA
That had me rolling on the floor. Well done sir!
Lol!
A good one today. The ‘shrooms’ must be kicking into high gear this afternoon!
“What will the comfortable classes do?” Funding the Future
Plenty of grievances and riots happening in Britain.
Not only the alleged far-right is newsworthy with legitimate grievances.
Around last week;
https://www.msn.com/en-in/news/world/violent-riots-break-out-in-leeds-and-in-east-london/ar-BB1qieQy/
LONDON: “Widespread rioting broke out in Leeds on Thursday night triggered by children being forcibly removed from their family by social services, and there were also riots in east London connected to the protests in Bangladesh.
In Harehills, a deprived area of East Leeds, where many immigrants, mostly British Pakistanis, live, a double-decker bus exploded in flames after being set on fire, police cars were smashed up and turned over and fires lit on the road…”
I’m so impressed with Molly Tuttle and Golden Highway. that i’ve gotten you all front row seats for a concert in King of Prussia, Pa. from a few days ago.
It’s an hour and a half of sheer wonderfulness, enjoy!
Molly Tuttle Live Full Show Concert under the Stars 2024
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vspEDfLhfe4
Thank you! I love Molly Tuttle. She is an amazing clawhammer guitar player, singer and songwriter. She takes traditional bluegrass to new levels. If people think there is no good music being made these days, they need to give her a listen.
In my dreams, I get to attend one of her concerts. Now I can watch a recent one on YT.